These Companies Stretched Their Brands to Make Even Bigger Bucks

IKEA has partnered with Oregon architectural firm Ideabox to launch a line of prefabricated homes.

From the Department of Head Scratchers comes news that IKEA is entering the “home-building” business. Hard to say whether the 69-year-old Swedish company’s foray into prefab living will work, but that’s precisely the fun about brand extensions: Predicting which will succeed and which won’t is tougher than handicapping horse races but way more interesting.
When they pan out, brand extensions sometimes surpass their parent company’s wildest expectations. And even when they don’t (Harley-Davidson cake decorating kits? Really?), ill-conceived extensions can every once in a while lead to great things. Exhibit A: ESPN’s branded cell phone experiment, which failed very publicly and at considerable expense. Except the experiment wasn’t really a failure at all, in that it led ESPN (where I worked in a different area) in directions crucial to the company’s now-thriving mobile business. And so, in honor of IKEA’s $86,500 Aktiv house, here is my list of the 10 Best Brand Extensions of All Time. (Got your own favorites? I’d love to hear about them in comments.)